Sunburst stayed with me a good while after I’d stopped crying, and that alone had taken forever, and he’d never shown a hint of impatience or annoyance with me and my weakness during the whole ordeal. He’d held me in his hug all the way until the last of my tears had dried out, and even asked if there was something else he could do! Though I appreciated it greatly, I was reluctant to ask for anything more of him; few individuals had ever been that considerate with me in all my life, and I didn’t want to take advantage of it! Trusty Shield’s persistent scowl and eye-rolling at my pitiable outburst had only consolidated that decision; it may or may not win me any favors, but I hoped it would at least help me avoid making any more enemies.
It turned out that there was one more thing I had to accept from Sunburst, whether I liked it or not: he’d made a decision to teach me everything I needed to know about pony society, and had refused to take no for an answer with a level of determination that would make Pharynx look like a worse wimp than I was.
So after I’d calmed down from the latest episode of crying and was able to focus again, he began his first lesson. Having established that I had no prior knowledge about the Crystal Empire whatsoever, he told me about its history, starting from its founding and early days, moving on to its thousand-years-long absence, then its return and the defeat of King Sombra, and the role that Spike and Twilight - who hadn’t yet become a princess at the time - had played in it, until he concluded with Cadance and Shining Armor’s reign and the birth of Flurry Heart.
It was then that I finally knew what I’d witnessed on my arrival to the empire: though Spike had mentioned the Crystal Heart a few times, he’d never gone into detail about what its purpose was and how it worked, and crystalling had never even come up in any of the conversations I’d had with him or with ponies! I’d heard a few ponies mention it on my first day here, while I’d explored the place disguised as a bird, but after so much time in hiding and enduring starvation, it had completely slipped my mind that I’d wanted to know more about it! And now that I did know more about it, Sunburst was grinning widely for having been the one to make it happen, and the love coming off him had become brighter and warmer!
And tastier…
Quit it, Thorax! Did he share it with you? As in, explicitly gave you permission to feed on him? No! So leave it alone!
“Why are you looking at me like that?” he suddenly asked, dropping the grin and raising an eyebrow.
Uh-oh. I had to tell him! But how was he going to react?
“Please don’t hate me… Your love is so pure and delicious right now and I kinda took a sip - but only a little! Don’t worry, I’m not feeding on you anymore and won’t do it ever again, I promise!”
His gaze softened.
“Why would I hate you? You’re my friend! And I should have known that you might be hungry and offered you a meal… or however changelings call it… When was the last time you ate, anyway?”
“I soaked up some love overflow from Princess Twilight and her friends while they were here.”
“And that was yesterday… So you definitely need to eat again! Go on, I don’t mind!”
“Are you sure? You’re kind of trembling.”
“I admit, it is a bit unnerving… I’ve never been changeling food before and don’t know what to expect in terms of what it feels like to be drained… but if it’s to help a friend, I’m willing to do it. Just, you know, don’t take everything, okay?”
“I wouldn’t, Sunburst,” Trusty Shield warned.
“Nopony’s asking you to,” Sunburst told him. “This is my decision.”
“No offense, but it’s a stupid one! What makes you so sure that he’ll keep it within tolerable limits?”
“Because he made that mistake a while ago and still hasn’t stopped beating himself up over it! Now, if you aren’t going to help, at least stand aside and quit interfering!”
“Sunburst,” I interjected, “I don’t think I should-”
“Yes you should! Go on, eat already!”
“Oh no you don’t!” Trusty Shield flew between us, shoved me away, and pointed his spear at me.
At the same time, the door opened and Shining Armor stormed in.
“What’s going on here?” he demanded.
“He was about to drain Sunburst!” Trusty Shield told him.
“I wasn’t!”
“I gave him permission! He’s hungry, for Celestia’s sake!”
“I’ve been hungrier and survived…” I muttered.
“Shut up!” Shining barked at me. “Sunburst, you missed dinner, and Cadance said she last saw you taking this bag of trouble to his room, and that was hours ago. Is everything alright?”
“Yes, and he isn’t a bag of trouble.”
“So why are you still here?”
“I’ve been teaching him about the Crystal Empire.”
“You’d better not have revealed any sensitive information!”
“I haven’t! Everything I told him is public knowledge!”
“Trusty Shield?”
“I can confirm that. They had a history lesson that didn’t go into more detail than what my nephew learns in school.”
That seemed to calm Shining, but only slightly.
“Fine,” he groaned. “Sunburst, go eat. Trusty Shield, keep the bug under guard and I’ll send somepony to bring you dinner.”
“Yes, Sir!”
“What about Thorax?” Sunburst asked.
“What about him?”
“He’s hungry. Shou-”
“He can stay hungry for all I care!” He practically pushed Sunburst out the door. “Go on, your food is waiting!”
Sunburst only managed to cast a glance at me before Shining slammed the door shut with his magic.
I debated for a moment whether or not to go after them and try to explain myself to Shining, but gave it up with a sigh. What good would it do? He hadn’t believed anything I’d said so far, with the exception of things that fit his preconceptions of me as a monster and an enemy, so why would that suddenly change now? The way things were going, I’d only make everything worse! Maybe Sunburst could share some advice on how to handle the situation? He knew Shining better than I did; he could at least tell me what not to do! Other than existing in the Crystal Empire, of course. But how soon would I see Sunburst again? I hoped this wouldn’t end in another restriction for me! Could Shining do that? Could he forbid Sunburst from being around me from now on?
I looked at Trusty Shield. He’d antagonized me so far, but could I do something to make him reconsider or question that hostility? To ease the tension at least if befriending wasn’t an option?
“Don’t even think about it,” he said through gritted teeth.
Right. This wasn’t a good time to try to work on his prejudice. After that talk about feeding, he’d probably think that I’d chosen him as a food source now that Sunburst wasn’t around. Would he think that regardless? I didn’t know him long enough to have an idea what to expect of him; maybe he would eventually turn out to not be as obstinate as he seemed now, but it’d take more than one evening to get there. If we could get there.
Deflated, I sat in front of the window and looked at the sky. Night had fallen already, and the moon and stars shone brightly onto the land below. The ponies’ crystal homes shimmered softly under the moonlight, a sight so beautifully serene that I could almost forget the tension that plagued my relationships with the ponies that surrounded me. Some of the ponies that surrounded me, I corrected myself; a few who had shared their friendship with me, though outnumbered by those who still had their misgivings, were enough to provide some light in the lonely darkness of hatred and keep me going, like the moon above would be enough to keep a weary traveller from wandering astray.
But the darkness still hurt and weighed heavily on me, and there was nothing that could be done about it until I gained more friends to keep the light alive.
I didn’t know how long I’d been sitting there, and I hadn’t noticed that the room had gotten completely dark until Shining and Sunburst walked in and lit up the torches, snapping me out of my trance.
“Change of strategy,” Shining told Trusty Shield, passing him a sandwich and a bowl of water. “The changeling is still to be kept under constant supervision, but he may be left alone in his room and in the bathroom. While he’s there, you are to stand in the hallway and wait for him to come out and then shadow him as ordered earlier.”
“What if he tries to sneak out through the window, Sir?”
“I’ve got it covered.” He approached the window and cast a spell on it. “Night Hawk tells me you already know what this spell does,” he told me. “I’ve modified it so ponies can open the window if they want, but you mess with it and you might end up in a hospital. Feel free to try if you don’t believe me!”
Trusty Shield snickered.
“That does cover it, Sir,” he said. “I’ll be outside. Oh,” he turned to me, “if you decide to test that spell at any time, don’t forget to open the door first so I can watch the show!”
“And don’t start thinking that I’m warming up to you,” Shining poked me in the chest. “That’s not gonna happen!”
“I can see that,” I muttered.
When they both left, I turned to Sunburst with questions in my eyes. He sat in front of me.
“Cadance and I confronted him while I ate,” he said. “She agrees with me that Shining is crossing the line with the way he treats you, and don’t ask for details because things got loud and, er... kind of ugly for a short while, but I guess it worked because he relented in the end and we worked out a compromise, which I would barely call that since it doesn’t go beyond letting me teach you and giving you privacy in your own room and in the bathroom, but it’s a start, right?” He smiled awkwardly.
“Yeah, it’s a start,” I agreed. “How did you do it?”
“Well, like I said… it got loud and ugly…”
“But you must have done something right to make him reconsider!”
He winced. “I don’t know if I’d call it that…”
“It’s that bad?”
“Aw, you’ll probably find out sooner or later anyway,” he sighed. “And I guess you deserve to know. Cadance was still upset over what happened earlier, and hearing about how Shining forbade you to eat didn’t help any, so in addition to the reprise of the argument they’d had after you got locked up, she said she didn’t recognize her husband anymore and asked him outright if he was Chrysalis or some other changeling in disguise. Then he got furious and asked her if she was one, and they both denied but neither believed the other, and… It’s been observed that changelings invariably lose their disguise when they faint, so Cadance used that as a last-resort proof of identity and blasted Shining into unconsciousness.”
Ouch. That was bad! And she’d done it because of me! If I hadn’t shown up or accepted her offer of citizenship, she wouldn’t have had a reason to doubt her husband! It was all my fault!
The dread that had overwhelmed me at this realization must have shown plainly in my eyes, as Sunburst stopped his narrative and put a reassuring hoof on my shoulder.
“And I have a feeling what you’re going to say, and it wasn’t your fault, understand? It wasn’t your fault! It may have been extreme, but Shining has crossed the line and she decided she had no choice! She was protecting you!”
“That doesn’t make it right, Sunburst,” I protested. “I never wanted to breed wrath among ponies! All I want is peace and friendship, and no matter what I do or how hard I try, I get the exact opposite! Why can’t I do anything right?” I hung my head and my eyes filled with tears again.
“Thorax, you have to stop blaming yourself for what others do,” he told me, scooting closer and wrapping me in a hug. “The experience that ponies have with changelings is bound to cause some friction, and you’re feeling it worst because you’re the one trying to bring the two species together and all that hostility has been thrown at your back. Things are bound to get ugly from time to time, but you can’t let that discourage you! You’re closer to achieving your goal than you think!”
“I don’t think I ever will at this rate,” I sobbed into his cape.
“Of course you will! You’re already friends with me, and Cadance, and Spike, and Twilight and Starlight and the other girls from Ponyville! And we stand by that friendship; we won’t abandon you! You’re a good guy, Thorax, and we’ll do everything we can to make everypony else see it!”
“But what if it doesn’t work? What if nopony else can see me as a good guy?”
“Then you’ll still have us, no matter what! Doesn’t that count for anything?”
I disengaged from the hug and wiped my tears. “It does.” It really did!
“Well, then.” He remained like that for a moment, then reached under his cape and pulled out a rolled-up scroll. “Anyway, I found this lying around. It looks like Spike’s claw-writing, and something tells me you’re the one who dropped it.”
I took the scroll and opened it, and sure enough, it was the list of addresses for my Ponyville friends! I hadn’t even realized I’d lost it!
“Thanks,” I said. “Where was it?”
“In the hallway by the stairs to the outside.”
“That’s where Shining met me when I returned from the train station.”
“And took you for questioning?”
“Yes. I can’t believe that was just yesterday!”
“I know. A lot has happened, hasn’t it?”
“That’s an understatement!”
He chuckled. I yawned.
“You’re tired, aren’t you? No wonder after a day like this! I’ll let you go to bed now.” He got up. “We’ll get back to our lessons in the morning, okay?”
“Sounds good. See you in the morning!”
“See ya! Oh, and Thorax? The bed, not the floor!”
I opened my eyes to an eerie half-darkness of my room. Everything was exactly like I’d left it before climbing into bed and falling asleep - not that there was much to be different with so few objects inside - but I had an odd feeling that something wasn’t right.
I got up. The bedsheets were disturbed - hardly surprising after I’d slept in them - but everything else was perfectly in its proper place and condition, and no matter how closely I inspected every object, I couldn’t find anything wrong with it.
Except for one thing.
When I looked around the room once again, trying to figure out what I might have missed, I saw the window was open. Hadn’t it been closed a moment ago? Who could have opened it? I approached it and reached out to close it again.
Wait. Shining’s spell. Better to leave the window as it was until a pony came by and closed it! I didn’t really have any issues with it being open or remaining so for a while longer!
But I became aware of a slight breeze coming in. Why hadn’t I noticed that before, too? No matter; I’d experienced worse on my journey! It might actually be nice to get some fresh air in, wouldn’t it?
And why was I still feeling like something was off?
Could it have something to do with the door suddenly being open? It had been closed a minute ago, I was sure of that! Had somepony opened it? But who? And why, and where were they now? I was still alone in the room; there were barely any hiding places, and anyway, I hadn’t heard any hoofsteps or wing flaps!
I stole a peek into the hallway. It was darker than my room, though I could still see surprisingly well in the darkness, and nopony was around. Everything fit well into what one might expect in the middle of the night… except that Trusty Shield wasn’t there.
Shouldn’t he be guarding my room? Shining wouldn’t have dismissed him so soon, and I was sure he’d meant to keep me under guard throughout the night just like during the day! So where had Trusty gone to?
Bathroom, maybe. Ponies did have certain needs, after all! But why did I feel like he wasn’t there?
I checked. No Trusty Shield. No anypony, for that matter.
So where was he?
The uneasy feeling inside me growing, I went to look for him. Part of me was trying to come up with reasonable explanations: maybe he had to go somewhere or do something unrelated to me and had chosen to do it while I was asleep and could be expected to remain like that until he returned to his post; maybe he’d gone after whoever had opened my window and my door, possibly thinking that I’d gone on a midnight stroll and not bothering to check that I was still where I was supposed to be.
But a faint whisper in the back of my mind warned of danger, one far bigger than a missing Royal Guard.
I crept on through the hallways, my hoofsteps barely audible in the deserted castle, the darkness around me gradually getting deeper and heavier, but somehow, I could still see well enough. Nothing seemed out of place as far as I could tell, and if it weren’t for the ominous whisper in my mind, I might have even enjoyed walking through the castle like that.
The whisper had grown stronger over time, almost to a scream, and yet, there was nothing at all that might have justified its persistent nagging.
Until eyes opened in the darkness next to me. Solid, blue, changeling eyes, clearly visible in the overwhelming Black.
I recoiled almost to the point of falling over, but managed to regain my balance and fled as fast as my hooves could take me. I didn’t know where I was going, nor did I particularly care; I just wanted to get away from the unknown changeling, and though I couldn’t hear his hoofsteps or the buzzing of his wings, I knew as sure as I’d ever known anything that he was right behind me.
I galloped like the wind through the still-darkening hallways, barely seeing anything by now but somehow still managing to find the right path and avoid colliding with a wall, and all around me, changeling eyes sprang to life, more and more of them by the minute! Where there had been one pair of eyes at first, now there were dozens, maybe even hundreds! And all of them were looking for me… looking at me! I fled faster than I’d ever thought I could, but though I was sure the hooves and wings of the swarm of that size in pursuit of me would be deafening, I couldn’t hear any of it over my frantic panting and the thumping of my heart.
It didn’t matter that I couldn’t hear them; I knew with all my being that they were right behind me, and if I were to make a tinies mistake or allowed myself to slow down, they would be all over me instantly!
So I ran in the impossible darkness, and ran, and ran some more… I didn’t know where I was going, and it didn’t matter. All I wanted was to get away from there, and yet, I knew it was futile: they would get to me sooner or later, and no matter what I did or how hard I tried, I couldn’t avoid it!
But I kept running regardless, and flying for short intervals every so often, though I didn’t like losing contact with the floor beneath my hooves, as it gave me some slight comfort to hold on to it for whatever deluded sense of orientation I could get from it, at least to know which way was down, though I had no way of being sure that I wasn’t running on walls or ceilings by now… How long had it been? How far had I gotten? I should have been out of the castle long ago! Was I running in circles? Where would I end up? Would I anywhere?
What did it matter? Keep running!
But I was running out of breath, my hooves were hurting, my wings were getting heavy, and my heart beat so fast that I wondered if it might explode! I couldn’t go on like this much longer!
Ignore that! Keep running! You can’t stop!
Keep going…
But the moment came when the strain became too much for my exhausted body; I collapsed on the cold, hard floor, gasping for breath, and all the willpower in the world wouldn’t be enough to bring me back up and send me running again.
The pursuing swarm never came.
The darkness cleared somewhat; though still heavy, it withdrew just enough to reveal a familiar part of the castle, one where I’d experienced fear, and betrayal, and indescribable joy.
I looked ahead: though it had seemed empty at first, I noticed now that the throne held a lone figure. I couldn’t tell who it was, or that it wasn’t a figment of my imagination, but the persistent whisper in the back of my mind that I’d ignored during the mad run went suddenly and irreversibly silent.
For some curious reason, that worried me more than anything so far.
The figure in the throne opened its eyes, and I no longer needed the warnings of my mind’s whisper to know that my life was over.
Piercing green eyes stared back at me from the darkness, eyes not too unlike the eyes of a pony, but unmistakably different; I had seen those very eyes many times before, and they had brought me nothing but pain.
I could recognize those eyes anywhere.
And I could recognize that laughter, that maniacal, deranged cackle that complemented the vindictive bloodlust in her eyes.
I tried to move; I tried to get up and flee again, knowing too well that it was futile, but Chrysalis was faster: she fired off a spell that left me paralyzed with pain, then grabbed me in her magic, ripped my wings out of their sockets, and tossed them carelessly aside.
Blood ran down my back and dripped onto the carpet in front of the throne, but curiously, I felt less pain than I might have expected. The fear, however, made up for it amply.
I became aware of a rope hanging from the ceiling. Interestingly, it looked like it was made of resinous slime, the same kind that the walls of changeling cocoons were made of. Had Chrysalis woven it? And when?
Unfortunately, I didn’t have to wonder about the purpose of that rope; I’d taken a wild guess at what was coming, and sure enough, she levitated me all the way up to it and tied the loose end tightly around my neck.
I groped at the noose, trying to tear up the rope or at least to ease the pressure on my neck, but no matter how hard I tried, it wasn’t working! I tried to shapeshift out of it, but couldn’t summon my magic! Panic threatened to overwhelm me in my desperate struggle, but I was still aware enough of my surroundings to notice countless changeling eyes all around the room. They hadn’t disappeared as I’d thought; they’d been there all along, waiting for their Queen to do what she’d intended to do now that they’d brought me to her! And now that their efforts had paid off and I was hanged and about to die, they were relishing every moment of it!
But it wasn’t over for them yet: Chrysalis nodded to them, and they swarmed me instantly; their fangs reached out for my flesh and were ripping it apart with fervor unmatched by anything I’d ever been subjected to! I thrashed violently, trying in vain to get them off me, but there were too many of them, and each was too quick, too strong, too vicious for my pathetic attempts!
I screamed to the top of my lungs, and flailed desperately with my torn-up legs, and it only seemed to encourage them!
Then, finally, a pair of fangs found its way into my eyes.
I snapped my eyes open to the sight of Cadance, Shining Armor, Sunburst, Trusty Shield, and a dozen of other ponies looming over me, most of them staring wide-eyed, the rest frowning. The drastic incongruity of this compared to what had been going on a mere second ago made me yelp and recoil so hard that I fell off the ground…
...onto the ground. Ow… I must have sprained a wing falling like that…
My wing! It was still there - both of them were! And Cadance and Sunburst were walking up to me from the other side of the bed, followed by Shining Armor.
I scurried under the bed instinctively upon seeing him, accidentally pulling the edge of the blanket that must have slipped onto the floor at some point, which pulled the rest of the bedsheets down and hid me from view, at least from this side. I fought the urge to shapeshift; it wouldn’t fool Shining into thinking that I’d gone away, and he’d only blast me again!
Would they be mad at me for acting like this? They probably were mad at me already for some reason if they were all here! What had I done this time? Would I get punished again? Would it undermine whatever marginal progress I may have made in earning their trust and friendship?
Cadance pushed aside the fallen blankets and crouched down until she was eye-level with me. Sunburst did, too, but Shining remained standing upright a little behind them. He was frowning, but at least his horn wasn’t lit up. A good sign, maybe?
“Are you alright?” Cadance asked gently.
“I… I think so…” I stammered out. “What are you all doing here? Is something wrong?”
“You were screaming your head off,” Sunburst said. “Woke us all up and we came running. You sounded pretty desperate, to say the least.”
You have no idea, Sunburst…
“I tried to wake you,” Cadance continued, “but couldn’t! You were tossing and turning and screaming and nothing I tried could snap you out of it… I was really worried about you!”
“We all were,” Sunburst added.
Shining snorted. I winced and retreated a little further under cover.
“Most of us were,” Sunburst corrected himself with an eye roll. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“I’d rather not,” I whispered.
“Even if it’ll make you feel better?” Cadance offered.
“I don’t want to burden you. It’s bad enough that I woke up half the castle! I’m sorry, everypony!” Then a realization hit me and I bumped my head against the bedframe leaping in apprehension. “Is Flurry okay? Did I wake her too? Please tell me she didn’t hear anything!”
This was Shining’s cue to push past Sunburst and get in my face.
“You did wake her!” he growled. “Be glad that I calmed her pretty quick or I would have fried you ten times by now!”
“Shining, dear, what did we talk about earlier tonight?”
“I’m sorry, Cady, but he keeps pushing it!”
“I don’t think that he chose to have a nightmare,” she said dryly, “especially with you throwing threats at him left and right for everything that ever went wrong in Equestria!”
“So why didn’t Luna do anything?” he demanded.
Princess Luna? What could she have done? I hadn’t even realized she was here!
“She probably couldn’t for one reason or another,” Cadance said, “but I will write to her first thing in the morning.”
So Luna wasn’t here after all? Was this another dream? I couldn’t make any sense of what they were saying!
“Aren’t you going to get out from under there?” Sunburst asked me.
Right. I must have looked like a first-class fool! But I didn’t really want to get out from under here; I couldn’t face the scrutiny of so many ponies I’d woken up! I suddenly had the urge to pile up more blankets to hide behind or under and to never come out of hiding! I let out a whimper.
“It’s okay,” Cadance reassured me. “We aren’t mad at you!”
“But I woke you all up for no reason…”
“So what?” Sunburst. “We’ll just go back to sleep! No harm done!”
“We’re kind of used to being woken up in the middle of the night,” Cadance chuckled. “Courtesy of Flurry.”
I cast a hesitant glance at Shining. He was still frowning, but didn’t respond otherwise.
“Come on,” Sunburst offered a hoof.
I relented and got out. The other ponies were still there, and they seemed to have calmed down in the meantime. Maybe it would be okay after all?
“Okay, show’s over,” Shining declared. “Trusty Shield, get back to your post. Everypony else, goodnight.”
The crowd left, followed by Shining.
“Goodnight, Thorax,” Cadance said. “And don’t hesitate to come to me if you need something. I mean it!” Then she left too.
“Are you going to be alright?” Sunburst asked.
“I think I will. I hope.”
“Would you like me to come spend the night with you? Or move to my room for the rest of the night?”
“Thanks, but I’ve bothered you enough already. Don’t worry about me; I’ll be fine.”
“If you say so,” he shrugged. “But if you change your mind, my offer still stands.”
“I appreciate it, but I really have to get used to dealing with this on my own. Goodnight, Sunburst!”
“Goodnight, Thorax! And, do sleep well this time!”